Lords Sitting of 10 July 1951

Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers

ABINGDON CORPORATION BILL
Read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

SPRING TRAPS BILL [H.L.]
2.36 p.m.
LORD ELTON: My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill to prohibit the manufacture, sale or exposure for sale, or use, or having in possession or custody of spring traps likely to cause unnecessary suffering; and to move that it be read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 1a— (Lord Elton.)
On Question, Bill read 1a; and to be printed.

NIGERIAN STUDENTS IN SOVIET,lb/> ZONE
2.37 p.m.
LORD VANSITTART: My Lords, I beg to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Queirtion was as follows:
To ask whether eight Nigerian students have been allowed to go to the Soviet zone of Germany for indoctrination, and, if so, what is the cause and reason of this proceeding.]
THE MINISTER OF CIVIL AVIATION (LORD OGMORE): My Lords, the facts are as follows. In May, 1950, the National Scholarships Board in Nigeria, a self-appointed body which selects candidates for scholarships provided by the Communist authorities in Eastern Germany, announced that a number of scholarships had been made available at schools and universities in the Eastern Sector of Berlin by the Central council of Free German Youth for the benefit of Nigeria. Eight of the candidates selected by this Board arrived in Berlin in
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February of this year. With the possible exception of three other Nigerians, whose present whereabouts are in doubt, no other students, to the best of my knowledge, have succeeded in reaching Eastern Germany. So far as is known, none of these people was in possession of a passport endorsed for travel in the Eastern zone of Germany or other Communist countries. The authorities concerned are urgently studying what further steps can be taken to prevent further cases of this kind.
LORD VANSITTART: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his reply. I am glad to hear that the matter is being studied, with a view to the prevention of further episodes of this kind.
VISCOUNT SWINTON: My Lords, may I ask the Minister a supplementary question? Was it not known in Nigeria that this— I think "folly" was the word originally on the Paper: no doubt, for some reason it was withdrawn and modifield into "proceeding," though I think the stronger term would not be out of place—" proceeding" was under way? If that was known in Nigeria, why were steps not taken by His Majesty's Government in this country to prevent these misguided young men from reaching Western Germany when it was known that, if they got there, they would be going on to Eastern Germany?
LORD OGMORE: My Lords, I am glad to relieve the noble Viscount's mind on that score. It was not known that any of these people intended to take up a scholarship in Eastern Germany: the authorities in Nigeria did not know that. One of these young men had a passport issued in 1944, which might have included Germany, though, in view of the date, I think it highly unlikely. As regards the other young men, certainly they had no passports enabling them to visit Germany. The passports were merely for the United Kingdom and France. The men were, as I have said, entitled to come to this country or to France, but, it was not known that they intended going elsewhere.
EARL HOWE: My Lords, when these students, or whatever one may call them, have completed their course on these scholarships, will they be free to go back to Nigeria and there cause all the trouble they can?
LORD OGMORE: They will be free to go back to Nigeria. The second part of the supplementary is a matter for conjecture.
EARL HOWE: I do not know that it is. Are they or are they not to be allowed to go back to Nigeria and create all the trouble and havoc there that they can?
LORD OGMORE: They will be free to go back to Nigeria, but we cannot say that they will cause trouble. They may have learnt from their experiences in the Russian zone how undesirable the Communist system is.
EARL HOWE: They may not.

NATURALISATION OF ALIENS
2.42 p.m.
VISCOUNT BUCKMASTER: My Lords, I beg to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether in view of recent events they are prepared to revise the present procedure for naturalisation of foreigners to the extent of insisting that the names of sponsors should be published in the Press.]
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT JOWITT): My Lords, this matter was fully debated on the Motion moved by the noble Lord, Lord Vansittart, in this House on December 13 last. His Majesty's Government have given further consideration to the matter but do not think that any grounds have since arisen which would make it necessary in the public interest to publish the names of sponsors to an application for naturalisation.
LORD VANSITTART: My Lords, seeing that security arrangements obviously leave a great deal to be desired in various aspects, would the Government be prepared to appoint a Committee to review the whole subject in its broadest sense?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This matter has been under most careful consideration. I do not think that is necessary.

RIVERS (PREVENTION OF POLLUTION) (SCOTLAND)(No. 2) BILL
Brought from the Commons; read la; and to be printed.
TELEPHONE BILL
Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and to be printed.

COURTS-MARTIAL (APPEALS) BILL
2.44 p.m.
Amendments reported (according to Order).
Clause 1:
Constitution of Courts-Martial Appeal Court
1.—(1) There shall be a Courts-Martial Appeal Court (in this Part of this Act referred to as the Court") whereof the judges shall be—
(d) such other persons as the Lord Chancellor may appoint, being persons appearing to him to he specially qualified for appointment as judges of the Court.
THE LORD CHANCELLORmoved, in subsection (1) (d) after "persons" (where that word first occurs) to insert: ", being persons of legal experience,". The noble and learned Viscount said: My Lords, may I take the first two Amendments together? The noble and learned Viscount, Lord Maugham, on the last occasion asked me what type of court I contemplated: whether it was to be composed of distinguished officers, with no legal training, or of distinguished lawyers. I think the noble Marquess, Lord Reading, asked the same question. It certainly is, and always has been, my intention that this should be a legal court dealing with legal problems, and I want highly trained lawyers to help me. The Bill, however, was ambiguous. Looking at the Bill, one could not tell which type of court was contemplated, and therefore I have suggested that we should put in the words on the Marshalled List in order to make the matter plain. I hope your Lordships will agree that this is an improvement. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 5, after ("person") insert (",being persons of legal experience,").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, as the noble and learned Viscount has said, this matter first arose in answer to a question of mine, and secondly by reason of an intervention by the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Maugham. I am glad that the noble and learned Viscount

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the Lord Chancellor recognises that the clause as originally drawn was ambiguous. We are grateful to him for that recognition and for having made the necessary change.
On Question. Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg to move the second Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Leave out lines 6 and 7.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 2:
Supplementary provisions relating to the Court
(3) The Court shall sit in London except in cases where the Lord Chief Justice gives directions that it shall sit at some other place, whether within or outside the United Kingdom.
THE EARL OF SELKIRKmoved, in subsection (3) to leave out "in London except in cases where" and to insert "in such place as." The noble Earl said: My Lords, on the Committee stage I asked certain questions about the arrangements for, and the place of sitting of, this court. May I, with your Lordships' permission, take together the two Amendments which stand in my name? I do so for this reason; that the answer I received both from the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, and from the Lord Chief Justice, was that the court should sit at forum conveniens, which I take to mean the most suitable place by which the ends of justice may be met. As this is not what the Bill says, it seems that it would be as well that the provisions in the Bill, should coincide as nearly as possible with the views held by the two noble and learned Lords who are most directly concerned in its operation. I am aware that so long as those noble Lords hold their present offices this Amendment is probably entirely academic, but no doubt in the passage of time both will vacate the offices they now hold, and it seems to me that the views they hold should to some extent be incorporated in the Bill. I therefore propose this Amendment, which leaves the venue of the court completely flexible and free in the choice of the Lord Chief Justice. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 15, leave out ("in London except in cases where") and insert ("in such place as").—(The Earl of Selkirk.)
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, the noble Earl has stated quite rightly what I and the Lord Chief Justice said. I understand that he is a little apprehensive lest, in specially mentioning London, there is a presumption that London shall be the place of trial unless other considerations are thought to outweigh that prima facie intention. We do not so regard the Bill. We want each case to be considered on its own merits. I have no doubt that London will be the place where the great majority of these cases will be heard, but as between London and Edinburgh there need be no presumption in either case. Each case will be looked at on its own merits. That being so, I advise your Lordships to accept this Amendment.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, this Amendment is consequential. May I take this opportunity of thanking the noble and learned Viscount for accepting these Amendments? I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 16, leave out from ("Justice") to ("whether") in line 17, and insert ("shall direct").—(The Earl of Selkirk.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 4 [Application for leave to appeal]:
The LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, perhaps I may take this and the next Amendment together, for the purposes of discussion, though of course I will put them separately. The first Amendment and the first half of the second Amendment are merely drafting points. The reason for re-drafting part of subsection (1) of Clause 4, and putting part of it into the new subsection (2) is twofold. First, the subsection is at present infelicitously drafted; secondly, by dealing with local lodging in a separate subsection we make Clause 4 similar to Clause 3 in this respect. For these reasons, we thought it desirable to make this drafting change. The real point of the second Amendment is to make it possible to transmit by wireless or any other means the information contained in an application for leave to appeal. One cannot say how often use is likely to be made of this provision, but it is desirable to do everything we can to speed up the hearing of an appeal, and it occurs to us that there may be some

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cases in which the necessary particulars can be conveyed either by wireless or cable. Consequently, if that is done we propose that that shall count as though the application for leave to appeal had been submitted in the ordinary way. I beg to move the first of these Amendments.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 25, leave out from ("appellant") to end of line 30 and insert ("and lodged, within the prescribed period, with the registrar, being an application in the prescribed form and specifying the grounds on which leave to appeal is sought and such other particulars, if any, as may he prescribed.").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg to move the next Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 30, at end, insert:
"( ) Rules of court may provide that, in such circumstances as may he specified in the rules, any such application as aforesaid which is lodged with such person (other than the registrar) as is specified in the rules shall be treated, for the purposes of the last foregoing subsection, as having been lodged with the registrar.

( ) Where an application for leave to appeal to the Court is lodged with a person other than the registrar in accordance with rules of court having effect by virtue of the last foregoing subsection, it shall be the duty of that person—

(a) to forward the application to the registrar with as much expedition as practicable; and

(b) if it appears to that person that it is practicable to furnish the registrar, before the receipt by him of the application, with such particulars of the application as will enable him to prepare a copy of it, and that, in all the circumstances it is expedient so to do, forthwith to furnish him with those particulars."—(The Lord Chancellor.)

THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, on the Committee stage I think our main preoccupation was to do everything possible to expedite procedure. Although this particular procedure will not be frequently resorted to, it may be that there will be cases in which it will be necessary, and from that point of view we welcome its introduction in the Bill.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved, after subsection (1) to insert:
"( ) Where an appellant convicted by a court-martial held outside the United Kingdom
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duly presents a petition under the last foregoing section and, before the expiration of the period within which an application for leave to appeal to the Court against the conviction is required by subsection (1) of this section to be lodged, the appropriate authority for the purposes of subsection (2) of the last foregoing section receives from the appellant such an application accompanied by a request that that authority will forward the application to the registrar in the event of its being decided not to grant the petition, it shall be the duty of that authority to comply with the request and accordingly, the right conferred upon the appellant by subsection (1) of the last foregoing section shall, if it has not previously become exercisable, become exercisable on the happening of that event."
The noble and learned Viscount said: This Amendment is put down to try to expedite the hearing of the appeal without doing away with the filter, if I may use that much overworked term. What we propose is that, in the case of a courtmartial outside the United Kingdom(those are courts-martial in which there is danger of substantial delay), the person affected may prepare his notice of appeal and deliver it via the appropriate authority, so that immediately the time is ripe for the hearing of the appeal—that is to say on the dismissal of the petition—the application for leave to appeal, which on this hypothesis, is only waiting in its proper pigeonhole, may be pulled out and put into operation. We believe that in that way we shall be able to avoid a substantial period of delay, and enable the man concerned to get everything ready beforehand. It is for that reason that we have put forward this Amendment. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 30, at the end insert the said subsection.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, this Amendment deals with a point which we raised in much the most substantial of our Amendments on the Committee stage. Perhaps therefore, it will not be out of place if I take this opportunity of thanking the noble and learned Viscount who sits on the Woolsack for the manner in which he has met us after discussions behind the scenes on all Amendments to this Bill. Substantially, the Amendment now in the Marshalled List gives us all that we want. As I said in connection with the last Amendment. we were mainly concerned with avoiding delays and the necessity of repeated plying, backwards and forwards, between

717
say, Singapore and Korea and this country. I suggested on the Committee stage that it was nothing like so important in the case of courts-martial held in this country, where the volume of delay was likely to be negligible, but that in the case of courts held abroad it might become a matter of very great importance. The suggestion that we should divide the two categories emanated originally—I must say this in order to give credit where it is due— from the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk. The Amendment now on the Marshalled List meets our point absolutely, and we are obliged to the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor for having accepted responsibility for it.
VSCOUNT BRIDGEMAN: My Lords. since I was associated with my noble friend in the discussions behind the scenes, perhaps I may be allowed to add one word to say how glad I am, front the operational point of view, that the noble and learned Viscount who sits on the Woolsack has seen fit to put forward these two Amendments. They will, I think, go a long way towards making sure that all those who are accused will have the same advantages, so to speak, at their trial, irrespective of the operational conditions in which they are serving. Until this Amendment was put forward, there was a real risk that, whereas the trials of men at home stations might go through with reasonable speed, the cases of those who by chance committed their offences at foreign stations, or in theatres of operations abroad, might be dealt with very much more slowly. The intention of all of us is that everyone who is accused shall have the same chance and the same prospect of a quick decision on his trial, wherever he may be serving. I should like to add my thanks to those of the noble Marquess to the noble and learned Viscount for what he has done in this regard.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved, after subsection (2) to insert:
("( ) In considering whether or not to give leave to appeal the Court shall have regard to any expression of opinion made by the Judge Advocate of His Majesty's Fleet or the Judge Advocate General that the case is a fit one for appeal, and, if any such expression is so made, may, without more, give leave to appeal.")
The noble and learned Viscount said: My Lords, this is an Amendment which
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I moved on the Committee stage, but the noble Marquess Lord Reading asked me not to press it at that time, in order that we might see it in its setting as part of this scheme. I put forward the argument in support of this Amendment on the last occasion, and I need not repeat it to-day We do now see the Amendment in its setting, and I think it is desirable that we should have it in the Bill. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 34, at end insert the said subsection.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, our suggestion on this matter was that the Judge Advocate of the Fleet or the Judge Advocate General should himself have the right to grant leave to appeal. But I see the force of the noble and learned Viscount's argument. He does not want to give even the appearance of any possible form of departmental interference in these matters, and he feels that the whose of the proceedings should be left in the hands of the court. So far as we are concerned, we are content to accept that position. This may probably be a piece of pedantry, but I do not know what is meant by the expression "without more." It is not a very usual expression to find in a Statute, and leaves one, I think, a little in the air. "Without more" what? "Without more inquiry or investigation" might have given a little more precision than the words which at present appear; but that, as I say, is probably to suggest a pedantic addition.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 8:
Supplementary powers of the Court
8.—(1) For the purposes of this Part of this Act. the Court may, if they think it necessary or expedient in the interests of justice,—
(b) order any witnesses who would have been compellable witnesses at the trial to attend and be examined before the Court, whether they were or were not called at the trial, or order the examination of any such witnesses to he conducted in the prescribed manner before any judge of the Court or before any other person appointed by the Court for that purpose, and allow the admission of any depositions so taken as evidence before the Court;
and may issue any warrants necessary for enforcing the orders or sentences of the Court.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved, in subsection (1) after paragraph (a) to insert:
"(b) order the taking of such steps as are requisite to obtain from any member of the court-martial by which the appellant was tried or the person who officiated as judge advocate at the trial a report giving his opinion upon the case or upon any point arising therein or containing a statement as to any facts whereof the ascertainment appears to the Court to he material for the purposes of the determination of the case;"
The noble and learned Viscount said: My Lords, now we come to another set of Amendments. Your Lordships will remember that the Bill as drafted provides that the court shall have the right to ask for a report from any member of the court-martial. It struck the noble Marquess, Lord Reading, and those who came with him to see me—and I must say that it struck me also—as being rather odd to have this part of the Bill as originally drafted. Normally, I should suppose, one would ask for a report from the President of the court-martial. Other members of the court also might be asked, but it would be rather odd deliberately to leave out the President and ask other members of the court-martial for a report. So we have put the matter right by this Amendment, which provides that, normally, and so long as there are no obstacles, the President is to be the person from whom a report of what has taken place at a court-martial shall be obtained. Of course, it is made plain that you may, if you so desire, ask other members of the court-martial, too. That is the effect of this Amendment. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 21, at end insert the said paragraph.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, the effect of these two Amendments is entirely to remove the objection which we raised at the earlier stage. There is additional cause for gratitude on our part, inasmuch as that after we had failed to produce a draft which seemed likely to meet the end which we desired to achieve, that has now been done for us in the form in which the Amendment appears in the Marshalled List.
On Queston, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, this Amendment goes with the one which we have already discussed. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 6, at end insert:
("Provided that the Court shall not make an order under paragraph (b) of this subsection for the purpose of obtaining a report from a member of a court-martial other than the president thereof unless they also make such an order for the purpose of obtaining a report from the president or are satisfied that the obtaining of a report from him is impracticable or would involve undue delay.")—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 18 [Furnishing, on appeal, of proceedings of court-martial. &c.]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, now we come to a group of Amendments which are merely drafting. I beg to move the first of them.
Amendment moved—
Page 12, line 37, leave out the third ("the") and insert ("any").—(The Lord Chancellor.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR:My Lords, I beg to move the next Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 2, leave out ("and").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg to move the next Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 3, leave out the third ("the") and insert ("any").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg to move the next Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 5, leave out subsection (2). —(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 19 [Duties of registrar and others with respect to appeals. &c.]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, with regard to this Amendment, the words "a hearing," suggest that there should be a hearing in court. Of course this thing is very often done without hearing anyone at all. It occurs to us that the words "the determination" are more appropriate. I therefore beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 17, leave out ("a hearing") and insert ("the determination").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, the next Amendment is consequential on the one we have already passed. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 33, leave out subsection (3).— (The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, this Amendment is drafting. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 17, line 6, after ("before") insert ("the receipt by the registrar of").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, this Amendment is also a drafting Amendment. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 17, line 8, leave out ("is received by the registrar") and insert ("or the receipt by him of particulars of such an application furnished in pursuance of paragraph (b of subsection (3) of section four of this Act, whichever event first occurs,").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.

MINERAL WORKINGS BILL
3.1 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading reading read.
THE PAYMASTER - GENERAL (LORD MACDONALD OF GWAENYSGOR): My Lords, although certain provisions of this Bill may cause some differences of opinion, and a little disagreement, I think its purpose will assure it a Second Reading in your Lordships' House this afternoon. That purpose is to remove the scars caused to the countryside by ironstone mining. I am sure your Lordships will wish to do nothing to prevent the restoration of the surface of the earth following surface mining. It is not always easy, frequently it is difficult, and at times I have known it to be impossible, to restore the surface to anything like its pre-mining condition; but it can he done, and I know of cases where it has been
722
done successfully. I well remember that, some four years ago, it became my duty, as regional controller in the north-west with the Ministry of Fuel and Power, to go round the countryside and examine the hundreds of acres that had been excavated in opencast coal mining. I could hardly believe that the surface could be restored to its pre-mining condition; but when I returned to some of those areas three or four years later, I was surprised to find that restoration had taken place so completely that I should never have known that any mining had taken place there. We know it Call be done, but it is sometimes a costly undertaking, and the purpose of this Bill is to help to finance the restoration of the surface in ironstone mining, areas.
The most desirable form of restoration is for agricultural purposes; I think that is generally agreed. But experience teaches us that restoration for agricultural purposes is not always possible. Therefore, we must allow for an alternative. When it is not possible to restore for agricultural purposes, the ground may be restored for afforestation purposes. The decision as to which is the proper course to take will be made by the Minister of Agriculture. It will be for him to consider whether the condition of the surface is such that he ought to encourage afforestation, rather than go on with any attempt at agricultural work.
The cost of restoring the surface is to be met in two ways. In the case of those areas, amounting in all to something like 25,000 acres, which were devastated by ironstone mining in the past, the Bill provides that the restoration shall be dealt with either by the local authority or by the land owner, according to which is more convenient; and the total cost will come out of the fund created under the Bill. Secondly, there are the mines which are working to-day, and mines which may be opened and worked in the future. These are creating daily the need for restoration. As noble Lords with any experience of surface mining know, it is possible to carry out restoration together with extraction. In this case the Bill provides that the Exchequer, the royalty owner or land owner and the operator shall contribute to the fund in these proportions: the Exchequer, 25 per cent.; the royalty owner or land owner, 37½ per cent.; and the operator, 37½ per cent. This will be levied on output at the rate

723
of 3d. per ton, making the proportion of payment: Exchequer, ¾d. a ton; the royalty owner or land owner, 1⅛d. a ton and the operator, 1⅛d. a ton. The total annual contribution will amount to something like £180,000 a year, estimated on current output, and it is expected that that will be adequate to cover the estimated need of £150,000 a year. The output of the mines, of course, will vary and the fund will vary accordingly, but we are satisfied that the income derived from 3d. a ton will be adequate to meet the cost of the restoration required.
The Minister of Local Government and Planning will be responsible for making payments from the fund. It may be that certain operators will need help as the work goes along, and if they can show that the restoration is being carried out to the satisfaction of the Minister they may receive interim payments. Claims can be made for all restoration completed after July 25 of last year. It may be remembered that on that date the Minister made an Order under the Town and Country Planning Act, 1947, requiring in all cases that the land should be levelled and that there shall be separate stripping and replacement of top soil in all but the few cases in which the land is unsuitable. One feature of the Bill may cause not a little thought. The depth of mines varies, and it has been necessary to establish a line of demarcation between various workings. That line of demarcation has been fixed at 35 feet. The restoration of a mine shallower than 35 feet is a different proposition from that of a mine deeper than 35 feet. The same consideration will be given to both categories of mine, but the payments made will differ in degree.
The rate of payment per acre will be settled in advance by the Minister, who will be assisted in making his decision by an advisory committee composed of experts. If it turns out that the cost of restoration is more than the Minister has agreed to pay, the operator will have to secure the balance; and if it costs him less, he keeps the balance. We believe that this payment in advance will be an incentive to operators to carry out the work.
There are two features of the Bill which may arouse some controversy—namely, the provisions in Clause 13 and in Clause 27. Although I do not think that this
724
is the occasion for discussing these clauses in detail, they are sufficiently important to make some reference to them in passing. Clause 13 caused considerable controversy in another place. Noble Lords who have read the debate will realise that the clause has created some alarm—I almost said some confusion. It deals with the development charge in respect of ironstone working. Let me make plain the underlying policy of the Bill. It is that each operator of ironstone, in addition to his present obligations, shall pay a levy of 1⅛ per ton towards an ironstone restoration fund. That is basic to this Bill. Clause 13 is designed to see that every operator does pay that 1⅛d. per ton.
May I illustrate the point in this manner? Assume that this Bill did not exist and that the proper development charge for a particular area of ironstone, fixed on a royalty basis, would have been 6d. per ton. This Bill is brought forward and requires the producers to contribute 1⅛d. per ton. What would happen if Clause 13 were not in the Bill, as was suggested in another place? The Central Land Board would be obliged to assess the development charge at 6d. per ton, minus l⅛d. per ton—that is, 4⅞d. per ton. The operator would then, under this Bill, pay 1⅛d. per ton; that is to say, he would pay 6d. per ton, just as he is paying without this Bill, and would make no contribution towards the ironstone restoration fund. In effect, the Government would be bearing the whole of the operator's contribution fixed by this Bill. Under Clause 13 the development charge remains unaffected, and will still be 6d. per ton, but in addition the operator will pay l⅛d. per ton, making a total of 7⅛d.per ton. The 1⅛ per ton will be his contribution to the ironstone restoration fund, in accordance with the underlying principle of the Bill that I have already mentioned. I hope that that illustration will help noble Lords to regard this clause a little more reasonably than was done by some Members in another place. We shall have ample opportunity to discuss the clause in detail on the later stages of the Bill.
As regards Clause 27, it will be remembered that the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced a scheme in 1949 for setting off development charge against payment out of the £300,000,000 in the

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case of certain minerals. This clause only provides the legislative frame; the detail has been published in the form of draft regulations in a White Paper (Command 8217). These draft regulations are now the subject of discussion between the Central Land Board and representatives of the industry and the land owners. It may give your Lordships some consolation to know that the regulations will need an affirmative Resolution of both Houses of Parliament. In a word, this clause enables regulations to be made permitting the Central Land Board to take a claim on the £300,000,000 in full satisfaction of a development charge.
THE MARQUESS OF READING: We have now gone right away from ironstone into a much wider field.
LORD MACDONALD OF GWAENYSGOR: It goes beyond ironstone, but ironstone is still within the province. I have tried to cover the Bill in its main points and its two controversial aspects. I do not think I need say more on Second Reading, as we shall have plenty of opportunity on the Committee stage to discuss further certain aspects of the Bill. In conclusion, let me say that the Bill is designed to restore to their pristine beauty those areas of the countryside from which the ironstone has been taken and which are not now very pleasant to look upon. That is not an easy task, but I know that that, in itself, will secure your Lordships' support. I beg to move that the Bill be read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Macdonald of Gwaenysgor.)
3.15 p.m.
THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, this is not an easy Bill to understand, particularly for anybody who has not spent his life in some aspect of the milling industry. It has all the complexity which one has come to expect from a measure emanating from the Ministry of Local Government and Planning. But with the general purpose of the Bill, as the noble Lord the Paymaster General anticipated, we have no quarrel. Indeed, it is to be remembered that in, I think, 1938, a then Conservative Minister appointed the Kennet Committee to look into this matter. That Committee reported in the next year, and no doubt, but for the outbreak of war, action would have been taken a great
726
deal earlier than 1951. Again, during the war the Waters Committee also owed its appointment to the same source and has proved, I have no doubt, a valuable foundation in the preparation of the present scheme.
The principle of the Bill—what I may call its Second Reading aspect—received a not unfavourable welcome in another place, although that welcome was perhaps a little chilled by the Minister himself saying at a very early stage of his introductory speech that there existed "a most shocking state of affairs." He also said:
"The land has been robbed of its mineral wealth, it has been robbed of its agricultural fertility … and the robbers having made their profits have mostly gone away."
We understand that that is the sort of remark which the Minister feels bound to make from time to time, in order to ensure that it is understood that his addiction to Socialism is as impeccable as it is improbable. But it is not a very satisfactory way for a Minister to introduce a Bill, because it indulges in a complete generality which in many cases, I think the noble Lord opposite will agree, is not iustified.
As I understand the history of these particular workings, the position is that before the First World War restoration was undertaken almost without exception —the greater part of the land was restored. Between the two wars, to some extent and in some places—and I think it is particularly true of Northamptonshire —there was a tendency to leave these disfigurements upon the face of the land; and that tendency has probably grown in more recent years. We agree that everything which can be done to remove those scars should be done. At the same time, there is difficulty, arising from the fact that, as time goes on, the machinery used for the purpose of excavation becomes larger in scale and more complex in working. The consequence is that the damage which the machinery itself does by way of disfigurement increases in proportion to the size and character of that machinery, and in the result the expense of restoration becomes a very serious item. Front that point of view, it is no doubt excellent that this fund should now be established, in order to assist those responsible to spread the soil and, so far as possible, to restore the character of the land used for this purpose.

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When the Minister talks in that very general tone, it is perhaps worth recording that the noble Lord, Lord Silkin (I am afraid that he is not now in his place), in discussing the matter when he occupied the office which Mr. Dalton now occupies, said in another place that of the 6,500 acres which were worked in Northamptonshire—which, as I have said, is recognised by everybody to be the worst area—only 19 per cent. had not been restored at the time when town and country planning came into operation. So that the picture, although I am not by any means painting it white all over, is by no means so black as the Minister of Local Government and Planning rather exuberantly described it in another place.
The position with regard to Government policy, as we have to consider it to-day, is that it depends upon two separate instruments. In the first place, it depends upon the Ironstone Areas Special Development Order, which imposed two conditions. The first was that in all workings proceeding it should be the duty of the operator to spread the soil behind the working face and to carry out that operation within two years of the time of excavation. The second condition was that where the overburden was 35 ft. or less, then in every case not only had the operation I have mentioned to be carried out, but the top soil as well had to be removed and replaced. That, I think, is the basis of the policy, and the real design of this Bill is to produce the finance in order to put that policy into operation. That is what I understand to be the present position and what we are now discussing.
The noble Lord who moved the Second Reading told the House the rates of contribution which are required under this Bill. They are, of course, flat rates. Although it might be difficult to produce a graduated scale, at the same time we are somewhat impressed by the possibility of injustice in imposing a flat rate. We are a little afraid that, in practice, it may result in the operator who has behaved in a public-spirited way, and who has done all the restoration possible, finding himself penalised in order to subsidise the man next door who has failed to do anything of the kind. There is another objection to the flat rate. The rate of royalty received by the land owner varies very considerably, with
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limitations anywhere between something in the nature of 2½d. and something in the nature of is. From the point of view of the land owner, to have to pay 1⅛d. on a shilling royalty may not be a very serious imposition, but if he has to pay 1⅛d. on every ton of mineral worked when he is receiving a royalty of only 2½d., from his own economic point of view it is a very serious consideration. From that point of view, we have in our minds some reservation—in spite of our recognition of the difficulty of the graduated scale—as to whether the adoption of a flat rate is really the answer to the question.
The other aspect of that particular matter—the payment in and the subsequent payment out—which causes us some thought, is the question of how this operation of spreading the land and restoring it will be carried out in practice. Who is the responsible authority? There is an advisory committee, to which certain persons of eminence have already been appointed, and we welcome in every case the selection which has been made. But, at the same time, so far as we can see, there is missing from that list of persons anybody who has a real practical expert knowledge of this highly technical work of restoration. I believe that the Minister indicated in another place that be would be prepared to consider including on the committee somebody who fulfilled those qualifications. We very much hope that during our discussions on the Bill here the noble Lord may be able to tell us that that promise has been transmuted into performance.
Again, we are somewhat concerned as to who is to carry out the day-to-day supervision of this work. It is not enough just to say to the operator: "You put this back, and when you put it back you come along with your certificate and we will pay you money." As I said, this is a highly technical operation, and what we want to be quite sure about is that somebody is charged with the day-to-day supervision. I imagine that one of the most frequent difficulties encountered is that in some soils very considerable limestone blocks are discovered. They create a difficulty which has to be met; unless they are put down at the bottom of the working, and the soil is piled up in successive layers on top, it may be that the restoration, how

729
ever expensive, will not result in the end in any great increase in agricultural production. That is the sort of thing about which we want to be careful. I should like to see somebody such as the restoration officer under the county agricultural executive committees, on the parallel of opencast coal working, reproduced in the operation of this particular Bill, even though our natural affection for a multiplicity of officials is not always obvious.
Another matter which we view with some apprehension is the point which arises on Clause 8—the payment on the basis of an average in certain circumstances. There are obvious dangers in paying excess above an average. If an operator carries out the work in these cases he is paid the excess over the average cost. During the discussions in another place, the Parliamentary Secretary put the average cost as being in the neighbourhood of £275 an acre. Much of the information in our possession goes to show that that is a highly exaggerated figure, and many of the oldest established firms would put it much nearer £140 or £150 an acre. Your Lordships will see the effect of that. If you put your average up to between £275 and £300, and a man knows that he is going to get paid what he spends above that amount, there is no particular incentive upon him to select the most economic way and the most efficient machinery in order to carry out the task which is imposed upon him. He is safe. He is all right. It does not matter what it costs, so long as he is not above the average. If a man could do it for £140 but is going to spend £275, it will mean a considerable drain upon the fund and, as I say, will offer no temptation to anybody to exercise a proper care in the application of the procedure laid down in the Bill.
Another thing about which we are anxious is the preservation of the balance between the claims of agriculture and the claims of forestry. Forestry has, perhaps necessarily absorbed a good deal of agricultural land in the past years, but at the same time we want to he sure how this land is to be used, and on what principles the Minister of Agriculture—who appears to have the last word—will decide these matters. If I may go back one moment, in that connection. to a body which I
730
mentioned before, the advisory committee, it seems to us regrettable that although the establishment of an advisory committee is one of the statutory obligations of the Bill, at the same time the Bill does not state with any precision what are the duties and powers of that advisory committee. We are still left to guess exactly what are the limits of its functions.
There is one small point to which I should like to call attention, although it might be thought to be in some ways a Committee point, and that is in Clause 22 (3) (c), where power is given to requisition land. It causes us some surprise that one of the instruments which can be called into play in order to carry out requisitioning is the War Damaged Sites Act. There is in existence a Statute—the Acquisition of Land (Authorisation Procedure) Act, 1946—which one would have thought was for all practical purposes sufficient authority and placed sufficient machinery in the hands of the Minister for the purposes contemplated by this paragraph in the Bill. And yet the War Damaged Sites Act has to be one of the methods employed by which land can be compulsorily acquired. My recollection of that Act is that that power was given to deal with areas in such heavily bombed tons as Plymouth, Southampton, Coventry, and so forth, in order that the worst of the debris might be cleared and the town present its most attractive face for the Festival of Britain. Here, surely, is yet another of those instances of extension of the purpose of a Statute far outside the field which Parliament intended. It seems to me that the use of the machinery of that Act is unjustifiable for purposes such as we are contemplating at the present moment.
The noble Lord anticipated—and I am glad we shall not have to disappoint him—that we might not look with unqualified favour on Clause 13. That is so. We have considerable misgivings about Clause 13. The levy which this Act imposes is 10. Under the provisions of this Bill as it stands, that levy is not to be taken into account at all in assessing development charge under the principal Act of 1947. That seems to us to be completely wrong, because, after all, the principle of the development charge, so far as I have always understood, was that it represented the difference between what was called the existing use value—the value of the land used

731
as it was at that moment—and the consent value, which was the value of the same piece of land with the planning permission attached to it. Now that was a method, at any rate intermittently comprehensible, and we set about sorting it out. Now you are importing this new feature. That is the basis of our objection to that clause, and I still think, in spite of the Minister's lucid exposition of the clause, that that objection cannot but prevail in our minds.
Clause 27 is a very different proposition. It has got into this particular Bill by methods which I cannot in any way detect or specify but which have nothing in the world to do exclusively with ironstone. What this Bill does very largely is to reverse the whole policy of the principal Act of 1947—the Town and Country Planning Act—in regard to existing interests in minerals. That is a very considerable step. We told the Government when that Act was before the House, that so far as minerals go the provisions contained in the principal Act would not work and although I do not want to carry out the always unpopular practice of saying. "I told you so," the fact remains that we have been from the beginning extremely uneasy as to the application of that Act to minerals.
What has happened now is that this Bill is intended to carry out a policy enunciated by Sir Stafford Cripps in 1949; and what it does is to treat all existing mineral interests as being (in that elegant Town and Country Planning language which has produced the word "conurbation") for this purpose. "near-ripe." A consequence of the Government policy is that the owners of existing mineral interests are to receive compensation at the agreeable level of 100 per cent. That would be a perfectly good policy from their point of view, but there is an entirely different aspect of the matter. The owners of those near-ripe minerals suddenly become, as the effect of this clause, preferential creditors on the £300,000,000 which was the total set aside for compensation in the original Act. There are already two classes of preferential creditors which have sprung up in the interval: the single plot owner and the registered builder. Now, in addition—I may say in passing that I am always glad to have the assent of the
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noble Lord, Lord Quibell—you create another class with very much more substantial financial interests than the mere registered builder (I apologise to Lord Quibell for the use of the word "mere") and the single plot owner. The estimate has been made that their claim on the Fund will be under £10,000.000; but the estimate of near-ripe mineral interests is something of the nature of £40,000,000 or more.
Most important, from the financial point of view, is that you have reduced the aggregate sum of £300,000.000, which you set aside under the original Act, to something like £250,000,000 for the payment out of the people who will be able to put forward claims, or who have already put forward claims, for compensation for loss of value. That is really a very serious consideration, and, apart from all other aspects, I cannot help thinking that it is so serious that it ought to have been given the dignity and status of a Bill on its own, instead of being slipped as a mere clause into this Bill—which deals, for the rest, entirely with the establishment of an ironstone fund. But we must make the best of it. We have a grave objection to this particular clause, although we like the Bill in general. It may be that the clause is in the Bill because it was expected that that would be the reaction of the Opposition, and therefore it was not inconvenient to put the unattractive powder into quite a considerable coating of jam.
There is one other objection to this proposal in Clause 27, and it is this. We are dealing with existing mineral interests, and those are to be treated for all purposes as near-ripe. A great deal of the land which contains ironstone is held by the operators in reserve under the form of enforceable options. That is a very convenient way of proceeding. A man does not necessarily want to acquire out and out all the land immediately. He has an enforceable option and, as he works out his existing land, so he exercises his enforceable option and takes over more and more land from his reserves and puts it into use. Those enforceable options are not covered by this new departure in regard to near-ripe land. Therefore, when the man comes to the limit of his existing workings and starts to turn to his enforceable option for a reserve, he immediately becomes liable to pay the development charge, although he has

733
made provision beforehand by this enforceable option for adequate reserves, so far as he can see, for his future needs. We do not go so far as to say that all land covered by enforceable option ought to be included under this clause, but we feel it ought not to be impossible to devise some formula by which land likely to be used for this purpose in the reasonably near future should be placed on the same fooling of near-ripe land and, from that point of view, should escape the development charge.
In effect, of course, this new policy is purely a book-keeping transaction. No compensation is paid out and nothing is paid in. It is purely a book-keeping transaction, but it does for certain purposes achieve the results and, except for the objections which I have indicated, presumably we must accept it. But, of course, there is again the trouble with what are called "dormant minerals," minerals which have not yet come to be worked. There again we find something like the enforceable option position. Future operators, when they come to start using their land, will have to pay the development charge which the existing operator has not had to pay. That is a very severe handicap to impose upon the newly arrived operator, because it at once puts him at a disadvantage with the established man. The only effect this state of affairs is likely to have is to discourage new people from coming into the field, because having, as they will have, to pay the development charge, they will find themselves unable to compete with the existing operators who, because this clause treats their minerals as near-ripe, escape the penalty of that charge. That again seems to us undesirable and we shall have to consider what Amendments we may find it necessary to put down on the Committee stage. Incidentally, looking at the timetable, it would seem that the Committee stage arrives with considerable precipitancy, because we have only a weak between now and the Committee stage in which to consider this very complicated Bill.
The only other matter that I want to refer to in passing arises on two of the Schedules, parts of a Bill which are not very commonly examined in your Lordships' House, but I think these points are worth calling attention to for their rarity and obscurity. These Schedules contain formulæ. The Second Schedule is described as a:
734
Formula for ascertaining contributions by mineral owners."
The Fourth Schedule is described as a
"Formula for ascertaining rate of payment for work in progress on 25th July, 1950."
Both those Schedules have presumably been designed to present a clear picture to the person who will have to carry out the actual operations prescribed by this Bill. And, just as it is a principle in Revenue matters that, so far as possible and within reasonable limits, the ordinary citizen shall be in a position to know what his liabilities are likely to be, so here, where a man has to make certain payments out under a statutory obligation, he should at least be given some indication, intelligible to the ordinary person, of what his liability will be and the method by which it is to be ascertained. May we look for a moment at the Second Schedule? If, when the noble Lord comes to reply to this debate, he likes to assume both a mortarboard and a blackboard to explain to the House——
LORD MACDONALD OF GWAENYSGOR: We shall need both!
THE MARQUESS OF READING: —how this Schedule works, we shall be very grateful to him, because I confess that not only am I in abysmal darkness on the subject, but I suspect that a great many other people, including those who will have to work the scheme from day to day, are and will remain in the some position. The Second Schedule formula for ascertaining contributions is:
"Let a be a sum equal to the payment falling to be made in respect of the interest under the scheme made uncler section fifty-eight of the principal Act."
I suppose that means something to somebody, but I am prepared to take that on trust.
"Let b be a sum equal to the development value of the interest as ascertained for the purposes of the said scheme."
and then:
"Let c be a sum equal to such part of the said development value as is attributable to the prospect of winning and working iron-stone by opencast operations."
I forbear to read the rest because it is rather long. The illuminating, practical result of that verbiage is to be found in paragraph 5 of the Schedule, where we arrive at the real heart of the matter; there the man ascertains exactly, once and for all, the operation which he has to carry out in order to calculate his liability. All

735
he has to do is to take note of the formula that
"The amount of the contribution is 9ac/8bd"
From that moment he readily proceeds with the necessary calculation, in order to transform that algebraic formula into terms of pounds, shillings and pence. Is it really necessary to have on the Statute Book anything quite so unintelligibly complex? After all, people are supposed to understand, and the supposition still holds ground in some quarters, more or less what is on the Statute Book. If we are to be confronted with algebraic formula of this kind, the ordinary person, endeavouring with the best will in the world to operate the provisions of the Act, must find himself at something of a technical loss.
Those, briefly, are all the comments that I desire to make on the Second Reading of this Bill, although, as I say, we may desire to put down Amendments on the Committee stage. We think it is a pity that Clause 27, bearing as it does on such a very different and general subject, should be comprised within the limits of the present Bill. We should have liked to give this Bill as it stands, even with that clause in, a good deal more careful study than is possible in the somewhat accelerated pressure of the moment. But, none the less, to the general principles contained in the Bill we are anxious to give our assent; and we are anxious to see the procedure set out in the Bill put into practical operation as soon as possible, so that the very considerable disfiguration which parts of the country have suffered may be rectified at the earliest moment.
3.51 p.m.
LORD MACDONALD OF GWAENYSGOR: My Lords, in opening his Second Reading speech the noble Marquess, for some reason or other, disclaimed any personal experience of mining. Those of us who have listened to his speech would hardly accuse him of having no knowledge of this mining industry. I anticipated that he would deal in the various questions he raised with Clauses 13 and 27, and I can assure your Lordships that, if you knew how complicated and how technical they are, you would not desire me to deal with them this day. These clauses can be satisfactorily left to the Committee stage, when
736
they can be dealt with in much more detail. They are in the Bill for a very useful purpose. I cannot agree with the noble Marquess that Clause 27 should have been in a separate Bill, but we can discuss both clauses on Committee stage. I knew before I made my Second Reading speech that neither of the two clauses would be wholly acceptable to the noble Marquess.
The noble Marquess has a great deal of experience in these matters, and when he refers to the imposition of a flat rate I do not think he would find a graduated rate any better. What does a flat rate do? It has many advantages. We have experienced these advantages in other mining industries. The effect of the flat rate is that those operators who are working land that can be restored cheaply subsidise those who are working land that costs a good deal to restore. This even distribution of the cost will avoid unnecessary dislocation in the price structure of ironstone, which is vitally important at the moment. It will avoid the danger of workings being abandoned because of expensive restoration, and it enables the cost to the ironstone industry to be limited to l⅛d. a ton over and above existing obligations. I hope that between now and the Committee stage the noble Marquess will find time to look into the question as to whether a flat rate has not more advantage than a graduated rate.
With regard to the personnel of the advisory committee, I cannot further enlighten the noble Marquess. I have not the name of the individual referred to by the Minister during discussions in another place, but it may be that between now and the Committee stage I shall be able to give the name to the noble Marquess. Responsibility for restoration lies with the Minister of Local Government and Planning. He relies on reports from the officers of the Ministry in the locality in question; if they make a favourable report to him that certain restoration has taken place, and that it is such that the Minister can certify and approve, he will approve it. That will apply equally to the restoration of land in ironstone mining as to the case of coal-mining. With regard to agriculture and forestry, the Minister of Agriculture is vested with large powers. He himself can decide whether the land can be restored

737
for agricultural purposes. If he does so decide, then the land must be restored. It is only when he considers that it is not possible to restore the land for agricultural purposes, but that it could be used for forestry, that afforestation takes place. I do not see any danger there.
THE MARQUESS OF READING: I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord, but may I just get that point clear? Do I understand that it is not intended to devote any of this restored land to forestry unless the Minister of Agriculture is satisfied that it cannot be restored for agriculture?
LORD MACDONALD OF GWAENNSGOR.: That is the advice I am given. He must be satisfied that it cannot be used for agricultural purposes before he will agree to its being used for afforestation. I have looked at Clause 22 fairly carefully. I understand the noble Marquess has raised the question because it refers to the War Damaged Sites Act. I am advised that the reason for this clause is that, where the Minister of Agriculture has to hire land in order to carry out restoration, he must be able to obtain possession quickly, otherwise restoration work already done may be prejudiced, or work may be badly held up. Under the War Damaged Sites Act, it should be possible to get possession in one month. That is the reason for Clause 22.
The noble Marquess dealt with some algebraic formulae with regard to the Schedules. I have before me sufficient algebraic formulæ to keep us going all the afternoon, but it is not for me to read them. The part of the Schedule that has been referred to is in the Bill because it is considered helpful in making clear the whole purpose of the Bill. I agree that this is a question which will need consideration, but I am satisfied, on advice, that this Schedule is necessary. I agree that for the layman it is a very difficult Schedule to understand, but I do not think the Bill would do what is needed if this Schedule were not there. I hope that I have said sufficient to justify the Second Reading of this Bill, although I know there will be much discussion with regard to it on Committee stage.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

MIDWIVES BILL [H.L.]
3.58 p.m.
House in Committee (according to Order), on recommitment of the Bill. The Amendment proposed by the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills made.

MIDWIVES (SCOTLAND) BILL) [H.L.]
House in Committee (according to Order), on recommitment of the Bill: the Amendment proposed by the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills made.
NURSES (SCOTLAND) BILL [H.L.]
House in Committee (according to Order), on recommitment of the Bill: Bill reported without amendment.

FESTIVAL OF BRITAIN (ADDITIONAL LOANS) BILL
4.0 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF WORKS (LORD MORRISON): My Lords, I think your Lordships will agree that the circumstances which have necessitated introduction of this short Bill, which comes to us from another place, have already been well ventilated. A White Paper of docurnents has been issued setting forth in considerable detail what my right honourable friend the Lord Privy Seal described as the "sad story" which lies behind it and which there has been no attempt to conceal. The utmost trouble has been taken to have all the facts independently investigated and made publicly available. It is frankly admitted that mistakes have been made, and the most energetic steps have been taken to put things right. For these reasons I will not weary your Lordships with a long speech but will try to put the matter in perspective as briefly and as fairly as I can.
During 1945–46, in response to public demands, preparations to celebrate the centenary of the Exhibition of 1851 were considered by the Government. Many Possible sites were examined but, as it was doubtful whether the necessary resources could be found, the project of another great International Exhibition had to he abandoned— perhaps it would he more accurate if I said replaced by the entirely novel and ingenious project

739
of a Festival of Britain, which is now being carried out with a large measure of success.
This change of plans took time, but by May, 1948, a national all-Party body and a new Government office had already been constituted and given three years to prepare and execute the scheme. Unfortunately it took about another six months to select and obtain the site for the South Bank Exhibition and to prepare an outline plan for it. I shall be surprised if those of your Lordships who have been concerned with immense negotiations and preparations consider that rate of progress dilatory; yet it was only at that stage that the council were able to gauge what type and scale of pleasure gardens would be necessary to complement the South Bank Exhibition and to relieve the overcrowding which would otherwise have been felt in central London this summer. Had it been possible to find room on the South Bank site, and had transport and traffic considerations allowed, the Fun Fair and Pleasure Gardens would naturally have been combined with the main Exhibition; but it was not possible.
By the choice of Battersea Park, with its direct water-bus communications to the South Bank, the Festival authorities have, by general consent, achieved an imaginative and wholly successful solution of a problem that many believed impossible of solution: how to accommodate throughout the summer in central London vast crowds, sometimes exceeding 150,000 a day, without paralysing the ordinary life of the Metropolis. Events have shown that the choice of Battersea Park as the complement of the South Bank was right; but, as many of your Lordships know, diverting to other purposes a large part of a public park is no light matter, and quite naturally several more precious months went by in negotiation and discussion before the scheme could be got into a shape acceptable to the local authorities and the numerous other interests concerned.
Through no fault of their own, therefore, the directors of Festival Gardens Limited (who included two members of your Lordships' House) started with the extremely difficult task of getting the gardens open within a tight time-table. I should think that the fear uppermost in the minds of those concerned was that the gardens might prove a "flop" from
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the standpoint of attracting the British public. Nothing of this sort had been attempted in this country before, and it was far from certain, as it always is in the entertainment industry, that the public interest could be gauged and satisfied and that people would be willing to find their way to Battersea in the necessary numbers.
It is easy to be wise after the event, and we know now that the directors, managers and designers of the company have brilliantly solved that problem, which makes us wonder why, having acquitted themselves so well in the more difficult part of their task, they could not also have guarded against certain weaknesses and errors which have been brought out in the reports of the independent chartered accountants and which seem, by comparison, elementary. Undoubtedly, they were most unlucky in the extremely wet weather which persisted almost continuously from last July until this May and which reduced the low-lying site of the gardens to a condition in which work was chronically interrupted and was made enormously more difficult and expensive than would otherwise have been the case. It was not only the rain and the waterlogging, but the disruption of time and progress schedules and the resulting demoralisation. This demoralisation was powerfully assisted by skilful Communist agitation on the site among the less experienced and more gullible labourers, as distinct from many of the craftsmen and the more mature men who did a fine job of work in difficult circumstances.
The Government, having entrusted the Festival Pleasure Gardens to a company, naturally did not seek to interfere with the way the company did the job, and were, therefore, not apprised until a late stage of the seriousness of the financial situation into which the management of the company was running. Immediately this situation became clear, changes were made in the top management, which is now working, at a satisfactory level of efficiency and is, in fact, earning week by week a very substantial balance of revenue over outgoings. I would add only one other point. From time to time suggestions have been made of scandals in connection with the finances of the company. The independent chartered accountants, whose reports are published in the White Paper, have found absolutely nothing to suggest that the management

741
of the company or of any of the professional or the contracting firms engaged have knowingly been parties to any irregularities which may have taken place at a lower level. Everything humanly possible has been done to seek out irregularities and to lay the facts before the police. None of those who have circulated such allegations have, however, yet been able to provide the police, any more than the company has, with any information on which any legal action can be taken. It is only fair to those who have borne the responsibility of preparing and executing this well-conceived and successful project that should make it clear that not a tittle of evidence which can be produced in a court of law has so far emerged from all the vigorous inquiries which have been prosecuted by my right honourable friend. the Lord Privy Seal, by the Board of the Company itself, by the two firms of independent chartered accountants and by the Metropolitan Police. Few businesses have been more searchingly probed than Festival Gardens Limited, and while I freely admit that there have been shortcomings in the preparation and construction work, I would ask your Lordships to look at the documents included in the White Paper and the story as a whole in the light of what I have said.
The Bill authorises the Government, with retrospective effect from March 20 last, to lend the Festival Gardens Limited £1,000,000, in addition to the loan of £570,000 previously made under the Festival of Britain (Supplementary Provisions) Act, 1949. This loan is necessary to enable the Government to reimburse the Civil Contingencies Fund, which had to be drawn upon in order to save the company from having to stop work on the gardens a few weeks before the opening day—with financial and other consequences which no responsible Government could have accepted. My right honourable friend the Lord Privy Seal has undertaken that he will not give the company any more additional money than is strictly necessary, and, as I have said, the company is now well managed and is making a large margin of revenue over and above all its current expenses. I beg to move that the Bill he read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill he now read 2a.—(Lord Morrison.)
4.12 p.m.
VISCOUNT SIMON: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Morrison, has such a deserved reputation for candour and persuasiveness that I have no doubt he will shortly secure the Second Reading of this Bill by general consent. Certainly no one on this side would seek to oppose it. But I cannot but feel, from the short account he has given, that his brief must have been prepared by Festival Gardens Limited, for, so far as I have noticed, he has not called any specific attention to the White Paper Documents Relating to Festival Gardens Limited, which contains some extremely disturbing matter compiled by chartered accountants whose independence in the matter the noble Lord recognises and we should all accept. Though, of course, there is no question of resisting the Bill, in my opinion it is only right to call auention to two or three of the matters recorded in that. White Paper. This measure has beer. certified by the Speaker of the House of Commons as a Money Bill and, consequently, there is nothiag this House car. do but pass it—and, indeed, I am sure there is no noble Lord who is not perfectly willing to pass it— and who recognises that it must be passed, because the Bill deals simply with the serious miscalculation of the cost to be incurred.
The Festival bids fair to be a success. as we all rejoice to know, and the Festival has to be paid for. I had the good fortune to go to the Festival Gardens last night and I enjoyed myself very much. I found a great deal there that is attractive and amusing, and I think that many people of all ages will greatly enjoy paying visits there. I did not see as many people there as I expected, but perhaps that was because it was not a very attractive night. But that is not the point. The point is that the cost has to be met, and it turns out to be vastly in excess of what was originally estimated. The legislative history of the Festival is a little curious. This is the sixth Bill which has been brought before us dealing with the Festival of Britain. I do not think that anybody who examines this White Paper can doubt that the circumstances which make the present Bill necessary are both surprising and regrettable. It is a story of miscalculation, followed by improvisation, which with all respect to the noble Lord, Lord Morrison, does not do any particular credit to this Government of planners.

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Here are the four or five facts which anyone who cares to read it can extract from this document.
The project of the Festival of Britain, to mark the centenary of the Great Exhibition of 1851, which was a success and, indeed, yielded a large profit, was announced to Parliament by Mr. Morrison as long ago as December, 1947. As he stated at a later date, and I think as the noble Lord implies now, right from the beginning it was intended to have an amusement park, a fun fair. That is the first fact. Yet it was not until November, 1949, practically two years later, that mention was made to Parliament of a scheme for the Pleasure Gardens. when the Festival of Britain (Supplementary Provisions) Bill was introduced, authorising the development of a part of Battersea Park as a Pleasure Garden. I appreciate that the matter needed great consideration, but I find it difficult to believe that when the authorities were preparing for a date which could not be altered—namely, 1951—it was right to spend two years in these mature reflections before the locality for this pleasure park was decided. A company was to be formed for the purpose of carrying out the scheme—a company of which, I may observe, all the directors were appointed by the Government. When appointed, the company was rightly left to manage itself, but the preliminary work, which the gentlemen who make the report in the White Paper do not regard as at all satisfactory, was the responsibility of the Government. The Act authorised the Treasury to grant £570,000 to the company (the Act called it a loan), while the London County Council might advance another £200,000. The total construction cost was stated by Mr. Morrison at that time to be estimated at £800,000.
Here I should like, in a most friendly way, to put a question to the noble Lord, Lord Morrison. I noticed in the White Paper that the chartered accountant, who has printed in an Appendix the terms of the loan agreement of November 24, 1950, makes a comment on one of its clauses. The loan agreement between the Lord President of the Council, the London County Council and Festival Gardens Limited. provides for these advances. Clause 10 says this:
"All moneys advanced to the Company by the Lord President and the Council under the
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terms of this Agreement shall be repaid by the Company within the period of five years from the date hereof"—
that is to say, shall be repaid five years from November 24, 1950. When I turn to page 6 I notice in the middle of the page this comment by the chartered accountant:
"Clause 10 is, and probably always has been, impossible to carry out."
It is unusual to form a loan agreement with a company, advancing them very large sums of money, to insert a clause requiring the money to be repaid in five years by the company, and to find that when an impartial and skilled person looks at the matter a little later he should have to report that a particular provision
"is, and probably always has been, impossible to carry out."
The question I wish to put to the noble Lord is this: Now that we are going to advance another £1,000,000 to the company, are we to understand that it is the intention and prospect of the Government that that amount shall be repaid? Is that also a loan? Or is that, in the light of the experience exhibited in this White Paper, also something which it will be found "impossible to carry out"? It is not for us in this House to be primarily concerned about how public money is used, but I confess that I should like to know, as we are now to authorise this considerable further expenditure, whether it is a grant, a gift, or whether it is a loan which it is seriously expected will be repaid.
The next thing that happened in this history (I am confining myself to the bald facts) is that four months after Mr. Morrison had estimated and announced that the total construction would cost £800,000, the estimate of expenditure had risen to £1,168,000—that figure can be found on page 13 of the White Paper. That striking increase had taken place before any contract had been made, and before a single sod had been cut. If we were dealing with ordinary affairs of business, between people accustomed to carrying on business, I feel sure that they would find that variation in the estimate a little surprising. The next point is that in November last a revised estimate was sent to Mr. Morrison (that also is on page 13 of this document), and by that time the figure of expenditure was estimated at £1,600.000, twice what had been quoted as the estimated figure at the time when the Bill was passed.

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I heard the noble Lord opposite just now explain that the Government, having just set up this company, could not be expected to be following closely its financial difficulties; and I think he said that the Government were not apprised of the increasing financial anxieties which were surrounding this enterprise. Is that quite so? I notice that the date when the estimate of £1,600,000 was furnished to Mr. Morrison was November, 1950. But Mr. Morrison never disclosed that fact to Parliament until March of this year. I cannot help thinking that, wherever the blame may lie, this most unpleasant fact was known to the Government, and to the particular member of the Government who was the Lord of the Festival, for a considerable time before Parliament was informed.
Then we come to March of this year, when Mr. Morrison revealed that the rate of expenditure which was being incurred in this project had gone up alarmingly. He said that on the revised figures available the total expenditure would be approximately £2,500,000, and that on that figure the loss of operation for six months only—if the venture ran for six months—might amount to as much as £1,500,000. He added, I think very naturally, that he was very cross about it —and I am sure that he would be. It so happened that that was just the moment when he handed over responsibility for the Festival to Mr. Stokes. Mr. Stokes, who has the qualification for being an extremely good businessman, at once instituted an investigation by two firms of chartered accountants, whose reports are contained in this White Paper, into the finances of the matter.
It is true, as the noble Lord said just now, that it is easy to be wise after the event. It is much easier to read these documents, and make comments on them, than to feel that one was qualified to see these difficulties in advance—I make no exaggerated claim at all—but these reports make very sorry reading. It appears that when the contractors began work in Battersea, only in April of last year, nothing existed but a general layout plan which had been prepared, and only a very limited part of the site was available. I know enough about this kind of thing, from the days when I was concerned with litigation,to know that the very first requirement of a contractor who has to do an elaborate piece of work on a site and to have it finished by a particular time,
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is to have the site handed over to him ready at the right time. That never happened at all. I should like to read a short passage from Mr. Butler's report. He is the first chartered accountant who reported, and he says this:
"… and I cannot but think that the period between July, 1949, and April, 1950, might have been used to better advantage. Had a definite plan been available and the main buildings architected by the spring of 1950, the site work could have been completed during the summer weather and subsequent difficulties largely avoided."
Nobody who has had any experience, practical or professional, with this kind of work will doubt that it makes all the difference whether such work has to be done in the summer or in the winter months.
Battersea—a part of London in which I lived when I first came here: and I rather think that Battersea Park was originally an island in the Thames—is a low-lying, place. The great trouble connected with this business has been created by mud and swamp, aided, I agree, by an unusually heavy fall of rain. What was so unfortunate was that you could not say: "Very well, then, we will declare that we are 100 years from the Great Exhibition of 1851 when we reach 1953." Unfortunately, the date at which the Festival was to be ready was settled beforehand. One can well understand what a difficulty Festival Gardens Limited found themselves in, and how, in an effort to make up for lost time, they were driven to accept uneconomic and wasteful methods of work—which I will not delay the House by illustrating from the pages of these documents. Everybody knows that once you have to apply extra pressure, to make impromptu arrangements and to rush a thing faster than it can properly be done, the speed at which the expense mounts may be terrible.
There are two passages in Mr. Butler's Report which contain very disturbing comments. The first one refers directly to what must he regarded as the responsibility of the Government. He says this, again on the first page:
"…the conception and organisation of the Board itself was unsatisfactory. Festival Gardens Limited is and always was a company with a complex and difficult job to get done by a certain date. The organisation of such a company would normally include a director responsible for construction, a director

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responsible for operation, a director responsible for finance, a managing director to co-ordinate their work, and such part-time directors as may be desirable for particular purposes. In this case thirteen unpaid advisory directors were appointed, all of whom were busy men in other directions and none of whom was specifically asked to undertake particular responsibilities."
It was not until a very late date that a managing director was appointed at all. All that seems to me to be very unfortunate. Let us, at any rate, bear it in mind if this kind of venture has to be undertaken again. The other matter, to which I am glad the noble Lord referred, has to do with irregularities of a different kind. At the top of page 3 Mr. Butler's report says that one of the reasons which caused financial commitments to be greatly in excess of the amount estimated was:
"The exceptionally low labour output"—
the very low proportion between what is done and the number of people who are supposed to be employed and are, in fact, paid—
"which has resulted from adverse working conditions, the excessively rapid expansion of the labour force and the desire to avoid strikes. In this connection I have noted that there is a general concensus of opinion that certain influences have definitely sought to foment discontent at the site."
Of course, that is not the fault of the Government, except in the sense that they must know that when a project must be carried through in a great hurry, if there are influences of that sort at work they have a very favourable field on which to play.
I am extremely glad that the noble Lord has already reported that Messrs. Peat, Marwick, Mitchell and Co., the accountants, say that they have seen no evidence at all to suggest that managements of any of the contracting firms or the professional firms engaged on any contract have knowingly been parties to any irregularities which may have taken place at a lower level. But is the noble Lord quite right when he suggested just now that it is for people outside to bring forward accusations of irregularities at the lower level? I understand that the suggestion is that a good many people have been drawing their day's pay without doing their day's work. They have clocked-in and got away with their money without doing the work for which they were being paid. That, surely, is not a matter upon which the outside public can
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be challenged to bring their accusations. I believe that the police have been doing their utmost to investigate this matter for some months. I know nothing about it, but I should have thought that the people who would be best able to help would be the people who keep the records and who have an opportunity of informing the authorities whether the work which was done was really the work which would have been done if everybody who was paid had done his day's work. At any rate, it is not a very pleasing feature, and, of course, the Government would be most anxious to clear it up if they could. I should like the noble Lord in his reply to be so kind as to inform me whether these inquiries are still going on, and whether, up to the present, there is any certainty, one way or the other, as to what has happened in that regard. I am not for a moment suggesting—indeed, nobody would—any accusation against the persons who are responsible at the top.
It is a bad story, and I do not think anyone can deny it. It has really provided only one bright spot—and with this I will conclude: indeed, the rules of order here, such as they are, would not allow me to refer to it save in a phrase. As a rule, Parliamentary debates do not make enthralling reading, but if anything could make Hansard a best seller it would be a speech which was made on June 25 in another place. Even the most thrilling Parliamentary oratory is rather like champagne—full of fizz when it is first opened, but very flat and insipid when it has been too long exposed, but the speech of Mr. Harold Macmillan on that day gave me—and I am rather interested in Parliamentary speaking—more pleasure than anything I have read for a very long time. I would commend to noble Lords, as a piece of bedside reading, the passages in which he put this particular muddle of the Government in its true relation to other and greater performances of the same kind:
"A little gem of mismanagement; a cameo of incompetence, this perfect little miniature of muddle, which will long hold a treasured place in the esteem of all true connoisseurs or collectors."
We can all afford to laugh at that because it is so well said. But, for the rest, I am sure that we shall desire the Bill to be carried into law and for the additional money (which has necessarily to be found) to be paid—and, let us hope, in due

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course to be repaid by the company to which it is lent.
LORD MORRISON: My Lords, may I reply briefly to the noble and learned Viscount—because I am sure he does not want us to continue this discussion indefinitely, as we might well do—with regard to his last point? I am afraid I am not able just now to say anything further about the irregularities to which I referred and upon which he commented, because police inquiries are continuing. The noble Viscount knows that in those circumstances I cannot make any further reference to the matter. When all is said and done, and this debate is read, I think it will be found that there is not much difference between the noble Viscount and myself. In fact, our expressions were almost identical. May I summarise what he has been telling the House? He said that it is a sorry story and very unfortunate. I said that it was a sad story, and, of course, I am not surprised at the criticisms he has made. But he started in a very charming way, and I found that he and I were at one on a number of points. First, he started by reminding your Lordships that he could not say anything about it, as this was certified as a Money Bill. Secondly, I was delighted to hear that he had been to the Festival himself and had thoroughly enjoyed himself at the Gardens. I had the same experience. I decided to go not as a member of the House of Lords. My wife and I went by bus to the Festival, and we did not in fact tell anybody that I was a member of the House of Lords. I may say we thoroughly enjoyed being at the Festival.
The noble Viscount will be interested to know that since it was opened some 3,000,000 persons have paid for admission. He will also, I think, be interested to know that, so far as my information goes, about 25 per cent. of that 3,000,000 have entered the Festival Gardens by way of the Pier—that is to say, they have made their way by water. I think that is a very interesting point.
Many of your Lordships, I believe, have not yet visited the Festival Gardens. I hope that you will be advised by the noble Viscount and myself, and go as soon as possible. It would do you good to spend a day there and see for yourselves what it is like. The noble Viscount
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will agree that if, like himself and myself, you are too old to venture on the thrill of the "Big Dipper" the Festival Gardens and the water effects are very lovely. I do not know whether the noble Viscount took a ride on the "Great Tottering Railway," operated by an engine of a weird and wonderful kind called "Nellie," which is more comical than any Heath Robinson contraption that I have ever seen. It would do your hearts good to spend a little time there; and if it did not cure any despondency you may be feeling I do not know what would.
If I may now say a word about the future, there is nothing in the present Bill which alters the effect of the 1949 Act as regards the date of the closing of the Gardens. Any continuation after November 3, 1951, will require special legislation. The Government believe, and I hope your Lordships will agree, that if it becomes abundantly clear that there is a public desire for the Pleasure Gardens to continue—and some noble Lords may remember that when I was moving the Second Reading in 1949 the noble Lord, Lord Llewellin spoke strongly in favour of something of the kind as a permanent feature of London life, on the lines of similar gardens in Copenhagen—arrangements should be made accordingly. In that event, there is every prospect that the admittedly unduly large amount of money which they have cost will be recovered. I said when I spoke before that the amount of revenue that is being made from the Pleasure Gardens at present is very considerable. I can only add that the opinion of the local authorities involved is being sought, and I hope that it may be possible for us, before your Lordships' House rises for the Summer Recess, to make an announcement as to whether the Gardens shall remain open.
The main question which the noble Viscount directed to me was whether the amount that was now being quoted was by way of being a further loan. He will notice that Clause 1, subsection (2) of the Bill says:
"The Minister may, with the approval of the Treasury, at any time release, in whole or in part, a claim against the festival gardens company in respect of a loan made by him thereto under this section."

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I thank the noble and learned Viscount for his contribution, made in such excellent taste, and I hope that your Lordships will now give the Bill a Second Reading.
On Question, Bill read 2a: Committee negatived.

SHOPS ACT, 1950
4.46 p.m.
LORD HADEN-GUEST LORD HADEN-GUEST rose to move, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty under subsection (1) of Section seven of the Shops Act, 1950, praying that the provisions of that Act relating to general closing hours which have effect only as respects the winter months, being provisions which would otherwise expire on the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty-one, be continued in force for a further period of one year until the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty-two. The noble Lord said: My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Lord Shepherd, I beg to move that an humble Address be presented to His Majesty as set out on the Order Paper. It is necessary that this should be done because otherwise the provisions of the Shops Act, 1950, which it is proposed to continue in force, would fall into abeyance. It is necessary to fix a general closing hour of 6 p.m. on a normal day, and 7.30 p.m. on a late day, during winter months—that is, for the period from the first Sunday in November to the day before the first Sunday in the succeeding March.
The provisions were first contained in Defence Regulation 60A ((b) and were incorporated in the 1950 Act, subject to the same conditions applying to the Regulation—in particular, that they should expire on December 10, 1950. I will not trouble your Lordships with details of the Act, as it is essential to deal only with this particular aspect if the Regulations are to continue to be in force during the winter period. Steps were taken last year to continue the provisions and they are now, therefore, due to expire on December 10, 1951. If the provisions were allowed to lapse the winter closing hours would revert to 8 p.m. on ordinary days and 9 p.m. on the late day, which are the general closing hours laid down in the Shops Act of 1928. It is thought that the earlier
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date chosen for presenting the humble Address this year will suit the general convenience of all concerned better than the later date, and it is for this reason that I am moving it to-day.
There are a number of important matters involved in these Regulations. One is, of course, the convenience of shoppers, and in this respect the existance of a five-day week has much relevance. Another is that late hours might entail the employment of more people and the dislocation of trade; and in view of the general labour situation and the need for higher production in industry, and the expansion of rearmament, that would be undesirable. I therefore trust that your Lordships will find it possible to agree that the humble Address be presented to His Majesty, and thus bring winter closing hours of shops into line with those of last year and the year before. I beg to move.
Moved, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty under subsection (1) of Section seven of the Shops Act, 1950, praying that the provisions of that Act relating to general closing hours which have effect only as respects the winter months, being provisions which would otherwise expire on the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty-one, be continued in force for a further period of one year until the tenth day of December, nineteen hundred and fifty-two.—(Lord Haden-Guest.)
On Question, Motion agreed to: the said Address to be presented to His Majesty by the Lords with White Staves.

SUTTON AND CHEAM CORPORATION BILL
Reported from the Select Committee, with Amendments.
SHEFFIELD EXTENSION BILL
Report from the Select Committee, That it is not expedient to proceed further with the Bill: Read, and ordered to lie on the Table.
BRIGHTON EXTENSION BILL [H.L.]
Commons Amendments considered and agreed to.